Musings and Sometimes Rants about the non-equal status of Fathers in Family Law and Parenting. Additionally periodic comparisons to the treatment of men compared to women in other areas including health care.

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

It's nice to see this group getting some publicity for their hard and determined work in Family Law Reform. MJM

The Sarnia Observer

Observer staff

Tuesday, May 29, 2012 8:38:12 EDT AM

SARNIA - Canadians for Family Law Reform have a few events set for the next few weeks.The family law watchdog group will host another public rally at Sarnia City Hall Wednesday. The public is invited out with signs from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m.

The group will next host its monthly public meeting June 6. Anyone who needs support in dealing with the family law system is invited to attend. Meeting will be held at the Ontario Tourist Information Centre, 1455 Venetian Blvd. It runs from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. For more information, visit canadiansforfamilylawreform.com or search “Canadians for Family Law Reform” on Facebook.

Saturday, May 26, 2012

The article shows thinking in the UK is still going on in terms of a child is deserving of two fit parents. I'm not optimistic this will bear fruit but at least it's still under discussion. Dads are shut out for ideological reasons not the best interest of the child and studies clearly show the negative impacts on children.

This is very important as Canada still looks to mother England, rightly or wrongly, for guidance with it's own laws.MJM

A host of social problems are made worse by the dismal way that 'contact disputes' are handled by the courts.

Every year, thousands of couples make their way through the courts, trying to resolve disputes about how to share the upbringing of their children. It has become a crushingly expensive way of creating single-parent families. Nearly half the parents (fathers, usually) who go to law in the hope of increasing the contact they have with their offspring end up losing touch with them completely within two years.

The Government is aware that a whole host of social problems are made worse by the dismal way that “contact disputes” are handled by the courts. The statistics show that children deprived of one parent do less well at school, are more likely to end up on benefits, addicted to drugs, or involved in crime.

It’s pretty obvious that a basic goal of policy in this area ought to be to ensure that children have relationships with both their mother and their father. And yet there is nothing in the existing legislation which even encourages the courts to aim for that outcome. So they don’t. The absence of any such requirement is one reason why so many disputes spend years in court without resolution, and lead to the creation of new single-parent families.

A little-noticed provision in the Bill on families and children in the Queen’s Speech earlier this month could help to remedy that depressing situation. It proposes that both parents should have the right to a meaningful relationship with their children, and that the courts should recognise that right – subject to it being compatible with the safety of the child.

This is a momentous change, with the potential dramatically to improve the way the courts process child contact cases. But for reasons that aren’t clear, it generates enormous hostility.Related Articles

The Coalition was advised against it by the Norgrove Report, which the previous administration commissioned to examine ways of improving family law. Mr Norgrove insisted that evidence from Australia – which introduced legal provision for a “meaningful relationship” with both parents in 2006 – showed that the result was that children were placed in situations where they were at risk of violence. He also said it had led to more litigation.

His claims have been comprehensively demolished by Patrick Parkinson, an Australian professor of family law. Litigation on child custody cases in Australia did not go up: it went down by a third. And an examination of the evidence showed that Norgrove’s claim that the “meaningful relationship” provision had led to children being put at risk of violence was “without foundation”.

The Government is to be congratulated for having had the courage to ignore Norgrove and insert into the Bill a requirement that both parents should have a meaningful relationship with their children. It is an important start – but it is only a start. If a “meaningful relationship” is not itself defined, it will only become an opportunity for more arguments in court about what it means. The result will be that it means nothing, and so does nothing to improve the chances that both parties in a divorce retain secure ties with their children.

The definition does not need to be put into the new statute, and probably could not be. But it can and should be inserted into the guidance that will dictate how the family courts operate.

Norway has a simple default position in divorce cases: the absent parent gets to look after their children every other weekend. Many states in the US have the same sort of rule. Something similar could be introduced here. It would greatly diminish litigation, and increase the chances that children would have a relationship with both of their separated parents.

In opposition, the Conservatives promised to introduce directives that would help the family courts to produce fewer single-parent families. It will be a dreadful indictment of their performance in office if they fail.

About Me

I am Politically active and right of centre on most issues with the odd exception such as legalization of "Mary Jane".
I advocate on changes to Family Law - an incredibly dysfunctional arena where parents are pitted against one another and children are the victims.
My picture will sometimes show me as a younger man simply because I like them.

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Leading causes of Injury to Women 2006

In 2006, unintentional falls were the leading cause of nonfatal injury among women of every age group, and rates generally increased with age. Women aged 65 years and older had the highest rate of injury due to unintentional falls (59.7 per 1,000 women), while slightly more than 19 per 1,000 women aged 18–34 and 35–44 years experienced fall-related injuries. Unintentional injuries sustained as motor vehicle occupants were the second leading cause of injury among 18- to 34-year-olds (18.7 per 1,000), while unintentional overexertion was the second leading cause of injury among women aged 35–44 and 45–64 years (13.7 and 9.3 per 1,000, respectively). Among women aged 65 years and older, being unintentionally struck by or against an object was the second leading cause of injury (5.7 per 1,000).

Injury related Emergency Department Visits

Unintentional and intentional injuries each represented a higher proportion of emergency department (ED) visits for men than women in 2005. Among women and men aged 18 years and older, unintentional injuries accounted for 19.9 and 27.5 percent of ED visits, respectively, while intentional injuries, or assault, represented 1.4 and 2.7 percent of visits, respectively. Among both women and men, unintentional injury accounted for a higher percentage of ED visits among those living in non-metropolitan areas, while adults living in metropolitan areas had a slightly higher percentage of ED visits due to intentional injury.